Remote controls for vehicles are well established and are currently used for controlling a wide span of vehicles ranging from simple radio-controlled toys to larger vehicles such as trucks, boats and unmanned reconnaissance aircraft.
A remote control unit normally communicates wirelessly with the vehicle, for example by means of radio transmissions or other suitable means such as infra red light. Alternatively, the remote control unit communicates with the vehicle by means of a communication wire.
In the marine sector, the use of multiple independently steerable propulsion drives now extends not only to larger ships, offshore platforms and the like, but also to yachts and smaller boats where an increased maneuverability compared to conventional fixed-drive/rudder combinations or conventional stern drives is desirable. The coordination of steering and thrust of the independently steerable propulsion drives in order to execute a desired maneuver is generally managed by an onboard steering computer. Here, the use of a remote control system for communicating with the steering computer allows the user or helmsman to move about freely aboard the boat into optimum vantage positions for various maneuvers. For example, the user or helmsman may conveniently stand near the stern or bow of the boat—whichever the case may be-in order to gently maneuver the boat alongside a dock or jetty while maintaining a close overview of boat movement.
A well known problem with current remote control systems, however, is that the relative orientation of the controls only coincides with the “normal” orientation of the fixed primary controls of the boat as long as the remote control unit is aligned with the stern-to-bow direction of the boat. As soon as this is no longer the case, the user or helmsman has to mentally convert (translate) the desired direction of travel into correct steering commands to the remote control. If, for example, the user or helmsman is facing backwards towards the stern of the boat, the correct steering commands to enter into the remote control unit becomes a mirror image of the normal commands to which the user or helmsman is accustomed. This problem is common to known remote controls of the above-described type and is often a contributing cause of maneuvering errors, especially in the case of inexperienced users.